In the late 70s Don was packed off to
London for a couple of months of R&R after his wife died. At the time it was rumored that a rival agency had
Don at the top of their wish list. So getting him out of town and out of sight
may have been doubly appealing to Leo Burnett’s creative head Carl Hixon.
At first everyone in London thought
he was some kind of charming mid-western naif, an aw-shucks-just-shook-the-hay-from-his-hair
innocent. He was hip to critters, but in
London critters were not hip.
But then he'd wander the creative
department and slip into offices unnoticed, as ideas were being battered around
but progress remained elusive. Frustration and voices rose. Then he would
quietly say something.
"You could always try..."
Suddenly people stopped talking, looked
at each other, then looked at him. Dan Parfitt, my art director and I looked at
each other, looked at Don, and thought the same thing: “That’s…good!” The word
got out. Don couldn't walk down the hall without being invited into every
office with an open door and a creative team with a knotty problem
Everyone wanted a piece of him. It
became a competitive game: Capture Don. Get him in the morning before anyone
else does, put him to work, then take him down the pub. Think Lawrence of
Arabia in the scene where Lawrence, having survived the terrible Nephood desert,
“God’s Anvil”, goes back into it to rescue a bedouin warrior the other tribesmen
had given up for dead. One by one each man offers Lawrence their blanket and
saddle, their hospitality.
“Come into my office, Don.” “Don, in
here---got a minute?” Everyone wanted his eye and nod of approval. I was no
different. At one point he turned to me and said, “Gerry, I voted for Nixon
twice, and you want my opinion?”
Of course that became the cover of
his leaving card.
Unlike Lawrence of Arabia, and any
creative director you can think of, Don was self-effacing. His talent was bigger
than his ego.
Then we discovered he could draw.
That was something not many art directors
in London would admit to, because it meant they would have to do their own
storyboards and miss time at the pub, instead of sending them to a studio for the
equivalent of £200+ a frame. Don did his own. And they were not just an outline
of the story. Looking at Don’s boards you could see the movie.
He drew the frames with
points-of-view and camera angles and movement indications he had already
thought about, as if he had pre-screened the spot in his mind. Because he had.
The only other person I ever knew who did boards like that was Tony
Scott.
Drawing and painting, of course, was
what he really wanted to do, what he trained to do at the Art Institute with the
likes of Leroy Neiman and Claes Oldenburg. His house was filled with his art:
paintings and drawings. But like many artists, he either had trouble letting
them go---as gifts or sales---or too much enjoyed teasing me and Jenness and a
few others with the promise of one. On the other hand, he gave Florence, our
youngest daughter, a painting and a bunch of drawings. This was the same
daughter he had carried sleeping and exhausted out of a hamburger restaurant on
Oak Street 30+ years ago when we first moved to Chicago. Rebecca, our older
daughter, still has her drawing of Tony inscribed with Art Director Spelling, “Rebbeca,
You’re Grrreat!”
With talent, charm and generosity, he
nurtured the spirit and talent of all of us.
An innocent abroad? Ha!